Dr Wang's story

Dr Wang made a complaint to the Ombudsman about how the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (Ahpra) managed her application for limited registration with approved supervision arrangements. After lodging her application, Dr Wang said she contacted Ahpra to update her supervision arrangements and provide the required information about her new employer.

However, when she received the decision from Ahpra about her application for registration, the Medical Board of Australia had approved her previous employer for supervised practice instead of her new employer. Dr Wang was frustrated because after making a complaint to Ahpra, she was informed that Ahpra had not received the email about her new employer.

Ahpra advised her she would need to submit another request for a change of circumstances in her supervision arrangements.

Our investigation found that, while Ahpra’s regulatory officer had no recollection of it, there were records showing Ahpra had received Dr Wang’s formal request to change employer, along with the required information about the new employer. Following our investigation, Ahpra apologised to Dr Wang for this oversight. Ahpra also offered Dr Wang a telephone meeting with a senior leader of Ahpra’s registration team to discuss next steps to promptly progress her application.